Thursday, August 29, 2013

San Cristobal Interpretation Center, Natural and Social History

We'll start our tour of San Cristobal, the Galapagos island closest to the continente, at the
Interpretation Center, but make a few diversions and finish with a bibliography, just like at school.

This facility, a gift from Spain, is about half a
dozen years old and is devoted mainly to natural history and the human history
of the islands.

It's pretty well done and worth the visit. I
"read" it cover to cover.

Apparently there was more going on in the
Galapagos in the last 500 years than in the last 5? million, and plenty just in
this century.

Geologically the Galapagos islands are unusual,
being volcanic in origin, currently active, and located at the junction
of three different tectonic plates riding over one another. The islands have
arisen in the west and are sinking below the sea in the east.

The newest island
is Fernandina, a fresh shield volcano of 500,000 years, whose lava continues to
leak from a hot spot beneath part of the Nazca plate into a bay close to
western Isabela, the most western island.

The oldest islands are the eastern ones, Espanola and San
Cristobal, and they are expected to eventually subside below the sea.

At the same time, ocean currents swirl around, five of them in an
intricate dance to the rhythm of the prevailing trade winds - no wonder water
temps and sea conditions are so variable in the Galapagos. The nutrient-rich
Humboldt Current originates in Antarctic waters so it's cold enough to cool the
air, leading to the odd sensation of sleeping under blankets near the Equator.
A fine mist, the garua, forms at higher altitudes, but the arid zones are less
affected. I'm told that from January into April, when northeasterly trade
winds prevail, the Humboldt loses its grip so the weather is hot and it rains
many afternoons, unlike the temperate conditions we experienced during July.
Then there are the El Niño years when 'normal' is turned upside down.

The Galapagos are of course noted for the large number of endemic
species, known nowhere else in the world, that developed in its isolated location.

The famous ones are the tortoises and iguanas, which probably drifted in
on logs from South American rivers but survived because there was no
competition from mammals (tortoises) or adapted (the marine iguanas learned to swim and dive to the bottom).

Several
birds are special: the penguins, the flightless cormorant. Others, like the
albatross, simply thrive in the isolation. The finches developed differently on
each island from a common ancestor; Charles Darwin was able to adapt or diversify his observations of
them into a successful new theory.

The most notable mammal is the Galapagos sea lion. I like to think of this image as having persisted for umpty-thousands of years.

Behind my back, though, are youths with surfboards, sunbathers, tourists with cameras, all new in the last century. I wonder what the sea lions make of it.

There may have been some human travel to these islands from around
Manta area on the Ecuador coast, fromwhence we ourselves came in Galivant, for usa trip of five days. In a reed raft back in the first
millennium, it would have seemed hard work with uncertain prospects to travel
in either direction. That culture is now extinct and known only by their
pottery shards.

The earliest known Europeans to find themselves here were in 1535,
in a ship transporting a Spanish Dominican friar Tomas de Berlanga from Panama
to Peru, where he was to mediate a dispute between the Spanish conquerors
there. Carried by the currents beyond sight of the continent, the ship
eventually drifted into the Galapagos, out of water, horses dying, etc.
Eventually they found water, but were otherwise unimpressed, not bothering to
take possession of the islands or to name them. Other voyagers drifted through
but none stayed, or were able to return, that we know of, until the end
of the 1500s.

Then it was pirates and buccaneers and later smugglers, passing through the islands, attracted by fresh tortoise meat, and the sometimes possibilities of water. But the heavy, some say rapacious, human activity really began with the whalers in the late 1700 and 1800s. They took sperm whales, but also fur seals, sea turtles and fish, tortoises and iguanas, fresh water and firewood. And they left behind goats and other domestic animals.

When Darwin sailed on the Beagle he was in his 20s (in the photo from the SC Navy Museum, he was 45). He was often severely seasick, and when he got back to England, he stayed put. He took decades to publish On the Origin of Species, and perhaps to grow the great white beard he's so often represented with.

Ecuador took possession of the islands in 1832, under the urging of
General José Villamil. He went to Isla Floreana and established a rather
utopian-sounding colony primarily composed of prisoners. He banished liquor,
and

"with the colony free of this mortal enemy of man, I have the
satisfaction of noting everyday better order, more harmony, more civility, more
decency…these are the same people now that I removed, for the most part, from
the jails of the State" Jose Villamil 12 Oct 1833

Villamil also introduced and released livestock as a 'good investment' never imagining the damage that would result from donkeys, goats, pigs and cattle, and associated rats, cockroaches, etc. When Darwin visited Floreana, he was visiting an active town, where residents could show him around. After Villamil left, his happy little colony degenerated and eventually nearly disappeared.

There are other stories about people who settled in the islands and traded with the mainland in tortoise oil (used in street lighting), salted fish and cattle hides, but few precise details now exist, only the remains of thousands and thousands of harvested tortoises.

One, Jose Valdizan, attempted to recolonize Floreana, again using convicts, and was eventually killed by one of his workers.

The same fate later met Manuel J. Cobos (left), who bought all of San Cristobal and planted sugar cane in the highlands. Later, either he or his son also began a coffee plantation which still exists today, a lovely spot under tall trees, and the coffee is delicious! However, he too used convict labor, (the Interpretive Center called it a concentration camp) ruling it with an iron hand, and was also murdered by one of his workers.

You can learn more about San Cristobal in the late 1800s on this cruiser's blog:

http://blog.mailasail.com/beezneez/1955.
Cobos is on April 7, 2013, in case you get lost on this very prolific blog. Thank you, Pepe.

The frisky blond-headed children were part of a Norwegian
contingent which came to the islands in the mid 1920s, hoping to make a
fish cannery. But conditions were not as they expected and most of them soon
left. In the 1930s more 'utopians', Dr. Frederick Ritter and his
'disciple', Dore Strauch, established themselves on Floreana, as did the
Wittmers, a German family. Not long after, an Austrian Baroness (as she
styled herself) and her two, or was it three, lovers arrived in Floreana,
stirred things up, then mysteriously disappeared two years later.

And so the
population of the Galapagos islands ebbed and flowed. Then, in 1978, the United
Nations designated the Galapagos islands as the first World Heritage site, and
the race was really on.

Ecuadorans from other parts of the country settle in the
Galapagos. They are not motivated by love of tortoises or marine iguanas -
they just want a better life in a comfortable climate.

I've read that the Galapagos Province has the highest per capita
income of any province in Ecuador. The fishermen from the mainland want to make
full use of what had been abundant resources, while the National Park wants to
ensure there is enough 'nature' left to keep attracting tourists. Things have
settled down in the ten years since the incidents of fishermen storming
national park and research center offices, but there are, as you would expect,
conflicting views about what is best for the population, and for the islands.
It all depends on who is calling the shots, and with what goal in mind. Of
course, the buzz words are 'equitable and sustainable growth'.

"Until recently, the future of humans
depended on the islands. Now the future of the islands depends on humans."

This is how the Interpretation Center
introduces its section on current issues. Some of the issues confronting the
present population, which has grown rapidly to over 30,000 people:

the population itself,

overfishing and other
resource conflicts such as how to develop agricultural land and

lack of water,

invasive species,

tourism.

A growing population of residents and tourists needs more supplies, more imports, and produces more trash. So, add trash disposal, energy production, risk of oil spills.

The invasive species are particularly devastating to the local ecosystem, and hard to control. Just off the top
of my head: feral dogs and pigs eat tortoise eggs while cattle and goats in
addition eat the vegetation upon which the tortoises rely, wasps eat
caterpillars the birds depend on (and sting tourists!), the rampant spread of
guava trees and blackberry bushes overwhelms native plants. This photo may be from the Charles Darwin Center on Santa Cruz.

Ecuador is a producer of oil, and the subsidized price of gasoline
and diesel is just over a dollar a gallon for Ecuadorans (yachts pay more!). So
is this street mural from San Cristobal about energy sovereignty, or
pollution? I am not sure that I understand the message, but I like the
illustration.

El Niño is a phenomenon with great effects on life in the Galapagos,
warm years favoring the land life, cooler years favoring the marine life, but
with great extremes of drought or deluge each way.

And then there is tourism, the major engine of the economy. Another 'invasive species'?

This sign indicates why we had to pay so much to
come here, and were not allowed to go anywhere on our own. Is it
Disneyfication? Control firmly in the hands of politically-connected tour
operators? A victory for the now-Galapagonian Ecuadorans who want to make full use of their
resources? Or the only way to prevent the place from being loved to death?
Similar issues face US National Parks, Yosemite a prime example, as I've read
recently in the NY Times.

So, there's a lot to be curious about in the Galapagos. If you're
interested, here is more:

A Galapagos bibliography

•http://www.lundh.no/jacob/galapagos/pg05.htm This is the best
single, non-touristic, source I found for a Galapagos overview. Jacob
Lundh is (was?) a Norwegian who spent his life in and around the Galapagos and
wrote a thorough and readable 'document' which is published and downloadable as
a 248-page PDF.

•

•Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galápagos_Islands The
condensed version (19-page PDF), with pictures.

•

•Wildlife of the Galapagos (Princeton Pocket Guides), Julian Fitter.
If you're interested in the wildlife, this is the guidebook for you, pocket
sized and thorough without being pedantic.

•http://blog.galapagosecolodge.net/ has nice photos and useful
information about the 'nature' side of things.

•A Galapagos Affair by John Trehorne,
published in 1983, details the lives of the three German-speaking households at
Floreana in the early 1930s. I was surprised that these happenings were
publicized in newspapers around the world at the time. And I was surprised at
the number of yachts that called at Floreana, and often left items very
valuable to the settlers. What yacht carries a wheelbarrow, or a spare stove, I
wondered? So I Googled them by name. These were YACHTS writ large: like Velero
III, (Allan Hancock in an elegant 100-foot motor yacht, scientific research
by day, chamber music by night), Nourmahal (Vincent Astor, 263'
motor yacht, also doing some science),and Phillips Lord, sponsored by
Frigidaire and broadcasting a radio program aboard the 4-masted schooner Seth
Parker. A reminder that it's all been around before.Galapagos
at the Crossroads by Carol Ann Basset "depicts a deadly
collision of economics, politics, and the environment that may destroy one of
the world’s last Edens" "A up-close personal account of the
difficulty in balancing what's best for these spectacular, fragile threatened islands and/or what's best for people--fishermen, tourism
industry" say the Amazon reviews of this $12.99 Kindle download, and I concur. It's always interesting to peek behind the curtain. Published in 2009,
from, I think, some older material, and sometimes repetitive; it would be nice
to read herversion of the current situation, and how the issues have evolved
under the current administration of Ecuador's president, Rafael Correa.

•Battle at the End of Eden, a 99-cent Kindle
Single by Amanda R. Martinez and The Atlantic Books(Dec 23, 2012) How
exactly does one go about ridding a tropical island of invasive species,
such as goats, and what are the politics of eradication? An interesting
discussion especially considering Basset's description of the goat eradication
efforts at Isabela. Martinez starts out with the story of a Galapagos fisherman
setting a goat ashore as blackmail, but moves beyond the Galapagos in her
discussion.

•http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1The Galapagos Islands are a World
Heritage site; here are some reasons why. Good for a quick overview, references
and photos

•http://www.galapagos.to/BOOKS.PHP is a site full of links to
other Galapagos information.

Well, I thought I could cut this post into two or more parts, but it's too complicated. To paraphrase Blaise Pascal, who is becoming a favorite of mine: "I made this post very long, because I did not have the leisure to make it shorter."Nor the leisure to fix all the formatting errors. Sorry, folks.

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About

Galivant is a verb meaning "to roam about for pleasure without any definite plan" and that's what we do here! Galivant is a 40-foot sailboat. The crew, Ann and Doug, finds sailing a good way to travel, and blogging a good substitute for postcards and letters we used to send home. However, the blog's most popular post is about howler monkeys (link Morning Soundscape).
More specifically, Galivant is a 1976 Valiant 40, #124. Doug is a 'retired' captain who wants to cruise again before he's too old to set the main. Ann cooks, cleans, navigates, facilitates- and is learning to blog. Your comments and suggestions are welcome here.